Wandering Child
by Soshika
Summary: Kaolin Dimma...young bounty hunter...dangerous...delusional...why? Even she can't understand...Very confusing, disturbing, angsty...blah blah blah..(part 4 now up!!)
1. To wander

Wandering Child**Wandering Child**  
By Soshika

This is the story of a bounty hunter. This is not the story of a child growing up, of making and keeping friends. This is the story of a demon who countered the light and came out complete. This is my story. This is the story of a bounty hunter. Not of someone to be comforted when the terrors of life strikes, not someone to cover eyes from blood. This is the story of someone who has seen many things in this world, both real and imaginary, and has nothing more to say except that it is meaningless. This is my story and i shall tell it as i will. This is the story of making a profit. 

Chapter One- Time Stands Still 

"The entire city of July...that fucker." 

I sat at a table in the mostly abandoned saloon outside New St. Lewis. The room was dingy and dark, and the paper i had in my hands wasn't much of a comfort. The man the paper was talking about was my target, or he was going to be. He didn't know it yet, that was all. I reclined carefully in my chair, propped my feet up on the table and read over the article. 

"Seven billion doubledollars...that's a lot..." I heard a voice behind me. I didn't turn or look, i simply stood. On my feet i was nothing impressive. I was short, though not too short, and my hair was long and dark. I looked like any fool kid out to make a few dollars in this world. Except i was more determined than any kid. Much more determined. 

I looked up at the voice now. A smiling man in a red trenchcoat with blonde hair very nearly towered over me. I looked up passivly, as if it was to one of just barely inequal height. Something in my face discouraged him, and his smile fell slightly. An overly friendly type. "Who are you?" 

The man scratched his head a moment and didn't seem to know. Sometimes that meant there was a price on heads. Heads who couldn't remember their names. I slipped my hands into the pockets of my long, dark, dirty coat and glared at him with dark eyes. The man suddenly started laughing. It might have been an irritating laugh, but the look on his face was purely cheerful and confused. A wall seemed to drop away. He seemed too friendly to have a bounty out after him. "Well I'm not quite sure right now, ya see." He smiled and spoke with bright eyes. 

"Name's Kaolin." 

"Kaolin? Kaolin what?" 

"Dimma. Call me kid and you'll regret it." I put ice in my words. Youth was no indication of wisdom or experience. 

The man's overly cheerful exterior seemed to fade a little. What had started as being playful had become something more akin to caring, to curiousity. "What brings you all the way out here to New St. Lewis? You're young to be alone." 

"I'm not young." 

"How old are you?" 

"How old are you?" I countered darkly. That laugh again. He didn't seem to know. His attitude was begining to rub off on me. I very nearly smiled back at him. "I suppose it isn't important anyway." 

He grinned and motioned out of the saloon. I was on my guard. I had only met this man a moment ago, i did not yet know to trust him for certain. He had the walk about him of someone who would hardly try to hurt a fly, but i'd known others like that before. Others like that before who had wound up with small fountains of blood spurting from thier heads as i stood by with a still smoking revolver. The man's voice was lighthearted, suggesting he enjoyed the company of anyone. "C'mon, walk with me." 

We walked down the dirty street a while, my soft leather boots making almost no sound. I noted he did likewise. this man's strid was almost nonhuman, it was so cheerful. It was almost as if he was oblivious to the poverty and danger all around us. 

We spoke idoly of proffessions. he admitted to merely being a wanderer, which was not all that uncommon. My voice was level and dark when i spoke. "I am a bounty hunter." 

For a moment fear flashed on his face. This was not unusual. Bounty hunters were not welcome most places. We were barely on the list of names to be shot on sight ourselves. I looked straight ahead as i walked. The fear on the man's face passed. "Bounty hunter, huh? Who you after?" 

I spoke in an automated tone. Buisness was buisness. "The man in the paper. The humanoid Typhoon." 

"Vash the Stampede?" 

"Yes." 

The man seemed indecisive a moment. Then he paused and shrugged, smiling brightly at me. I walked on. "I'm Vash." 

I smile cracked on my lips. "Tell me another one." 

He took a few strides to catch up- his legs were longer than mine. He spoke with an almost mournful tone, but not really. "I didn't expect you to believe me." 

We walked on in silence. At the stables we parted ways. This was not to be the last is saw of this man. 

***** 

"You can't lodge here!" 

"Why the hell not?" I brought my fist down hard on the hotel desk, making the clerk and bell both jump. The bell dinged when it landed, while the clerk just appeared to sweat. I had an irrational aggressive flare sometimes. This was one of those times. 

"Your type aint' allowed here!" 

I felt something hot behind my eyes. I identified the feeling as rage. It felt good to over react sometimes. "MY type? MY type?" swiftly, my only silenced handgun was out of its holster and to this man's head, pressing into his flabby wrinkled flesh. In that moment, as it always did, time froze for me. Everything was preserved, the feeling of the hardwood floor, the second hand on the clock above the desk, the flash of worn red carpet i caught out of the corner of my eye, the drop of moisture in the corner of the man's eye. 

Time began to move again, very slowly. The man reached a quivering hand towards his registry and pushed it towards me. "I...I...suppose...we could...um..make an exception...ma'm..." 

"That's what i thought." I spun the gun over my trigger finger and caught it in my palm with the grace of an artist, and placed it back in its well worn holster against my left side and under my arm. I signed my name in a few scrawling letters and pushed the registry back at the old geezer. The air smelled of dust and paniced sweat. That smell seemed to follow me. 

"Well well well..Kaolin Dimma....Crazy Kaolin." 

I whirled, on my toes, fetched the revolver from my pocket with one hand and the silenced handgun from the holster with my other. Voices from behind in such places were not safe. The old man ducked behind the counter, I knew why. No one enjoyed gunfights. No one except me and a few others. 

But what faced me didn't faze me in the least. I'd seen the face countless times, on countless posters, in countless places. A fellow bounty hunter. Not one i particularly got along with, unfortunately. We were too evenly matched to be friends or partners. 

"You're still using those two?"

Straightening and clearing the rage from my mind, i holstered the silenced weapon and pocketed the revolver. My rival faced me with the same dark, emotionless proffessional void that is expected when bounty hunter meets bounty hunter. "Let's take this outside, May."

May, May D., May the Demon, inclined her head sharply. She walked as if she had a pole up her ass. May had always prefered to walk that way, as long as i'd known her. I prefered the slouching, centered, balanced way of moving. We stepped outside the hotel, and i realized what this would come out to. We would both move on, give up staying at this city.

People walked past us as we stood a few feet apart, oblivious to who we were. May had an overcoat on as well, one that kept out the dust like mine and the blonde man i'd met weeks before. Everyone had such a coat for riding across the vast deserts of this world. May's was grey though. A driveling grey like a rain that would never fall here. Like faded machinery. Like faded past. Like gunsmoke.

"You're still fancying yourself a gunslinger, huh Kaolin?" May spoke with an absolutely cynical tone to her words. I knew why. No one else would. 

"Cut the crap." "You're here after Vash the Stampede as well, aren't you?"

"The trail's days cold, you're late too. Forget it."

May smiled in her evil way. The way that meant she thought she was crawling inside your soul and peeking at your thoughts, the smile that said 'you belong to me.' I had no countering face. "But you're still here."

"That's my own buisness."

"You'll never catch him." That sneer, that smirk, that smile! I could feel the rage burning inside me. "You're too much a pacifist."

"I am not a pacifist."

May Demon grinned. "No?"

Without hesistation i drew the revolver and fired. Not at May, not at a person, but into a window. An upstairs window. The shower of glass rained into the room above to tinkle on the floor like chimes. Someone screamed, and kept screaming. Maybe I'd hit them. I didn't know. 

But May kept grinning and folded her arms beneith her cape. "Never willing to hurt anyone."

Anger was blazing inside me. I wanted to fire at her, but people were already looking. I did not want to be reported. This city proved to be less than bounty-hunter friendly. "Overconfidence breeds weekness," I spat.

May yawned and looked thouroughly bored with me. "So you say, so you say. But we'll just see who catchs him first."

"f--- off, Demon."

"Try to be a little more proffessional, Dimma." Her eyes darkened a second. I hit a nerve. I lay off it. Hitting nerves was a low way of getting a response. 

Turning, returning the revolver to its pocket, i walked away from May Demon. I walked down the road and away from the scene, still angry. We would both be moving on now, quickly as possiable. And on seperate trails. I hoped mine would be the freshest.

Pondering, walking and hardly feeling, i hadn't noticed someone grabbed me by the arm until they began speaking. I looked at who it was and with distaste saw it was the town sheriff. He had bright eyes and a young face, with flaxen hair cut very short. He was all primp and position. 

"You can't fire a weapon in my town like that!" He growled at me, and looked as if he might try to arrest me a moment.

For a second, my eyes were unreadable. Then i moved with the quickness of a serpent striking, and the silenced handgun was under his chin. "Who the f--- says?" I spoke with exagerated slowness, venting my aggression.

Time stopped again. Everything slowed. I could see the fear in this man's eyes, the meeting with his own mortality. I also knew what that would do to him since i wasn't going to actually fire. He was going to become angry, and probobly go after me. I was a danger to society, he'd tell himself. Just as bad as the Humanoid Typhoon, they'd say someday.

I let the sheriff go and time started once more. People gathered around gasping and tugging at both of us, trying to pull us into the mass of the crowd. The look on his face was what i expected. He was mad now, mad for my humiliating him. He would get back at me. He thought that.

"I do whatever i damn well please," i said softly to him, and turned into the crowd. People parted from my path at the sudden movement, and i dissapeared into them. 

"My name is Hoyes!" The young sheriff shouted after me. "You're gonna remember it, because you'll be hearin it again!"

I indeed supposed i would. I was going to be seeing a lot of faces, hearing a lot of names and having time stop many many times over before i finally ended this. I could feel it in the air now. 


	2. To discover

Wandering Child**Wandering Child**  
By Soshika

Chapter Two

The sands do strange things to a person's mind. As I walked, the winds whipped about my ankles and tugged at the edges of my coat. I stepped onto the soft sands, my boots making a barely auidable crunch, metal and plastic against shards of unrefined glass. The sun was in my eyes as I walked, but I merely squinted against it. Towards the setting sun, it was the only known place I could begin my search for certain. 

Iapral City. The last known place that Vash the Stampede had been sighted. Growling in my throat, I adjusted the neck of my jacket and glared. Sand swept up and became clouds against the setting sun, glowing orange. What do people seek out in this wasteland? This waste of their lives and work? Fools...The only way to make any money was through death. 

Death... 

I began to walk on the desert, towards the setting sun. Whatever lay ahead would soon meet me, and find itself, like all things and all time, frozen at the barrel of a gun. 

*** 

The cry of a tomas far off brought me awake in an instant. For a moment I thought it had been one of the dreams...one of those strange ones, the inexplicable ones where you find yourself chasing something with great meaning, only to find at the end that it essentially meant nothing in all seriousness. A vast sea of sleeping nothing. 

The tomas cry was no dream. I rolled away from my sleeping bag and towards my coat deftly, making not a sound against the sandy soil. In a second, the silenced pistol was in my hand, snuggled into my grip. The metal was cold from the night desert air, and the grip chill and stiff. It didn't matter. Without a sound, I cocked the hammer and lay on my back in the sand, waiting. 

Soon the sound of pattering feet grew closer. In the dark, my eyes adjusted with the help of the double moon and stars. Nearing now, I could see it, was a stocky reptilian tomas heading in from the direction of the town I had left. Had that idiot sheriff followed me out here alone by himself? Or was it perhaps May D? 

I waited until the tomas was in range before rolling onto my stomach and firing three shots at the beast. I heard two connect with the chest of the animal, and it stumbled and fell. The third, however, the one meant for the rider..I did not hear. Strange... 

Climbing to my feet in the darkness, I refused to take my hand off the trigger. Something here wasn't right. Stepping cautiously away from my camp, I crossed the expanse of sand towards the place where the tomas lay dying. Its thin tongue lay stretched out on the ground as its sides heaved, trying to suck air into lungs which now had two holes in them. The animal was strong, I had to admit...Two sucking chest wounds and it was still alive for a bit. But... 

I knelt beside the beat and felt the seat on its back. Warm...Where was the rider? I stood and glared about me in the dark. 

Time froze. I hadn't done it. Cold air and a warm feeling nearby..air compressed a snak-snak sound...I dove to the side just as a bullet swirled through the tendrils of hair that swept behind me in the desert air. DAMN! I'd just been shot at. I whirled around and returned fire, but again, time wouldn't freeze. Who was OUT there? 

A shadow stepped foreward and laughed slightly, cheerfully. I lowered the pistol for a moment... I was out of ammo. I'd have to rely on brainpower alone now. A few simple dodges and kicks could relieve this person of their weapon too...Even if it was May D. 

The shadow held its hands up. I recognized the voice when it spoke. The blonde haired man from before. "Hey, you almost got me back there. I wasn't trying to start anything, honest!" He sounded genuinely sorry. 

I snorted and smirked slightly. "You idiot." 

"I was just thinking," He sounded increadably sheepish when he spoke, stepping closer. I could see him clearly now, tall and blonde in the red coat. "Now that you've already killed my tomas, maybe we could travel together. You dodged my bullet, you're not half bad." 

"You weren't trying to hit me anyway. You knew I would dodge." 

He seemed taken aback a moment before his tone changed to something far, far more serious. "You're right. I heard what you did back in that town. I knew you'd been trained well enough to dodge at least that one..." 

"I travel alone," I stated, and began to walk back to my campsite. 

Three small objects came flying at me in the dark and I sidestepped. The bullets I'd fired rolled to my feet in the sand. I looked back out of the corner of my eye and smirked. The man in red grinned at me. 

"At least to the next town. It can't hurt to have someone to talk to on the way," He grinned again and stood. 

I glanced down at the bullets and smirked. The breathing of the tomas silenced behind us. A man who could prevent my stopping time... and dodge three bullets. Intruiging. 


	3. To collect

Wandering Child**Wandering Child**  
By Soshika

Chapter Three

I was having the nightmare again. 

It only happened once in a great while, like a cloudy day on this baked world. Once in a long time, but it was too soon every instance. I could never be ready for the nightmare, and it was the same every time. Conquering it was useless. Pointless. And so, I faced my nightmare headon, without a hope to tame it. Ever. My only hope was that when it was finished, it would release me back into the real world as it did every time. 

There was always a chance it wouldn't let me go. 

I was standing alone in a vast baked wasteland, but the sand was red and caked tight. Cracked, like a flash flood had run through. Everything was tinted red, as if a paintbrush dipped in blood had swept over the landscape sloppily as if guided by a child. First there was nothing before me, then there were sounds. Far off sounds, and the wind pulled at my hair and coat. My breath caught in my throat because I knew what was coming next. Like a terriable monster rising out of the sand, I knew what was next. 

An echo of a child's laugh danced across the landscape, echos of dogs barking. This was what drew me in every time. For a moment the world flushed slightly blue, but the heat only intensified. The echos grew louder, clearer, hammering in my head until they weren't echos anymore they were voices! Voices directly behind me, and this time I knew they had to be real, they had to be alive....No! Clenching my hands at my sides into fists, my arms shook inside the jacket sleeves. I squinted my eyes shut and gritted my teeth. "No, I know what I'm going to see..." 

Blinking open my eyes the landscape had turned around me. I was facing a city, a city bathed in red. The clouds above swirled in a hellish vortex as if some massive demon was being released onto this world. Husks of shattered buildings, their componants scattered across what used to be a street like building toys of some reckless child. The laughing was gone all that was left was an echo, a mournful wailing far away echo. A scream, a laugh, a crying? I couldn't tell, I couldn't know, but the city's destruction burned into my eyes, swathed in red. The wind moaned and tugged at my knees. 

Then the people began to move. Broken, burnt, torn up people lumbering without purpose, their eyes sunken in and their mouths slack. They looked like corpses, corpses moving across the wasteland yowling in a far away sound. A zombie army of the living dragging themselves out of the destroyed city, their cloths and hair and faces all tainted red, a swirling flowing red. Their hands were like claws, and they groped through thin air for any purchase like blind rats on a table ledge. 

"N...No..." The word escaped my lips like it did every time as my body began to shake. The first of the faces turned towards me, its head lolling to one side in some sort of farce on an owl. Cracked and dried, the person...its tongue spilled out of its mouth as it forced a step towards me. A rasping hiss like wind through machinery clawed its way out of the creature's throat as others mimiced it and began to stagger towards me. My eyes were wide open now. 

The hard ground hit my knees as I fell, but I sank slightly. Cracked and dry the ground might have been, but it was soft with soaked blood. My hands were trembling so I could barely hold myself still as the walking dead began to close in on me, moaning and grasping as if I could do something. "No," I rasped out and shut my eyes, grabbing the sides of my head and writhing my fingers through my hair to try to shut them out. "No, I can't help you damnit! You're all dead! I can't save the dead!" 

Spidery hands grabbed at me, pulled and tore at my cloths and face and I screamed, screamed and kicked.... 

"Hey! Wake u-OW!" 

With a gasp, I jolted awake in my own sleeping roll. Moving one hand swiftly over my chest, face, arms...I checked to make sure I was all there, that the creatures hadn't torn me up. I sighed when I realized I'd been let go, again. 

"Jeez, you don't need to hit so hard in your sleep you know," Lighting quick reflexes jumped awake and the barrel of the silenced pistol was aligned with the nose of he who had awakened me. He blinked green eyes twice before I realized it was the blonde guy I'd met earlier. Oh, that was right. We were travelling together. Glaring and twirling the gun around my finger on its trigger, I caught it by the barrel and held it back. The idiot. What did he want now? 

"You alright kid, you sounded like you were havin a nightmare." 

The gun was in his face again. "Don't call me kid." 

If his tone was anything but mock-afraid, I had a hard time placeing it. The blonde man had no fear. He'd dodged three bullets, but that had been long range. This close? Hmph. Well, we'd just have to wait and see. "Whoa, sorry. Just wanted to know if there's anything I can do." 

I snorted air through my nose and lay back quickly, folding my hands behind my head, trigger finger resting along the side of the gun. "You can start by shutting up and going back to sleep." 

For a moment he sat up looking at me before folding his own arms behind his head and laying back down. "Moody. See ya in the morning." 

A faint smile tugged at my face as I stared up at the stars and dual moon circling above. How many more nightmares were there? And what did any of them mean? 

Only time would let me know, and it was very good at keeping its secrets until they were due. 


	4. To flee

When I think about my childhood, there really isn't anything there. How old have I been, how young have I been? It's so blurred, so inconceptial. I feel it slip away from me like water, something like air or wind. I can feel it, I can't define it. What I know now and what I knew then...I feel as if I've moved backwards in time. A wise man once said that maturity is realizing how little you know. I think he was correct.  
  
I can feel the sun so hot at my back now, it feels as if it's not the same as when I was younger. Like the entire world changed beneith my boots in only a few years. I used to play in the sand as a child. I have memories of chaos and adventures, I can recall the time I was taken to the town doctor isles away when a poisonous animal got to me. They bought me a tin of fruit drops afterwards, because I had been quiet and good. I don't suppose I knew I was going to die if they hadn't done something. I don't suppose any of us really know that until we're dying. I get the feeling sometimes that time has moved backwards..that we had more, and only a little is left. Like a ring of hard water around a bathtub.   
  
I can hear music in my mind as if ingrained by my ancestors...music I'll never hear in this place. Like I'm a walking artifact encased in a shining new security system. No one will ever punch through. Is this why I wander? Is this why I hunt? Am I looking for others like myself, or just a little clue to the past that's no more than a sand scarred stone?   
  
***  
  
"So you've been hunting for all these years. Don't you get nervous?" The blonde man across the table from me was speaking again. He seemed to never shut up. Having entered this town, I hoped he would leave me alone of his own violation. But he was still following me like a damned stray dog I'd accidentally fed. Perhaps the longer I ignored him, the more he wanted to stay. Damn.   
  
I glanced over the top of the paper at him, quirking an eyebrow. Half of my attention had been trained on the paper, the other half to the radio in the background. We sat on the light stone patio outside, which looked over the center of the town. Some children clattered by, I saw them over his shoulder, waving their arms and laughing. I narrowed my eyes and tried to think if there was a time I too did that, one I could readily recall. His eyes were fixated passively on me and he blinked, quiet and curious. I grunted and shook he paper in my hands, returning to reading it.  
  
A young girl with red hair came quietly to our table and set two cups of tea down. I did not look at the blonde man as I took my tea and sipped it tenitively. The young girl...I felt her eyes move over me from under red bangs as she walked away, serving tray pressed flat against her front. The wind pulled lightly at my hair and I returned to reading the paper. That girl was going to be a problem, I felt it inside me, simply from the way time twitched when I felt her look at me.   
  
A voice that dropped to a cynical flat tone was talking to me now, I had to tune it back in. Him again. "For someone who's supposed to be a bounty hunter, you sure seem out of it."  
  
Could time freeze on him? He'd stopped it once but I wondered. I felt time slip forwards around me as I gauged my chances. I could see the Tomas dropping in my memory and the bullets falling to my feet when he threw them. No, no chance of that. However...Inside my jacket slipped my hand to the revolver nestled at my side. I saw him stop and grab the edges of the table, to do what he didn't have a chance to show. Time froze on his wide green eyes like pools of paint, and the ripples in my teacup, still hooked around the index finger of the same hand holding my paper. A corner of the paper itself was halfway bent, frozen as it ruffled. The sun was reflected on the tarnished barrel of the revolver, and the hammer clicked back, connected. A gunshot ripped through us all, and time lurched back to life. His teacup shattered in all directions, spraying him with liquid and spattering the back of my paper. The gun went quietly back into its holster and I smirked over at him, ruffling my paper. He seemed frozen with his arms over his face, defensive.   
  
"Point taken," he laughed shakily and set down his arms, sitting bolt upright and grinning fakely. Afraid? Maybe. Maybe bluffing fear. I wasn't going to risk assuming that on a man who for his own sake could stop time from freezing. I sighed and checked the weather, trying to ignore him again. People were staring since the gunshot had gone off, I could feel their eyes boring into us. He swept the teacup peices into a pile and folded his arms over them, trying to make it seem as if nothing at all had happened. I looked up to take another quiet sip of my own tea and caugh the eyes of the red headed girl leaning in the corner. She looked afraid. Afraid but something else as well. Damn.  
  
"If you're wondering why I haven't shot you," I was quiet, the most subdued tone I had. "It would be more in your interest to ask."  
  
I felt him grow serious and it shook me. I dropped the paper as my tea slipped over the edge of the cup and spattered on the paper, pooling ink and brown water. I stared at him now, the attitude change was so drastic. Was this...really him? Was this instead the man who stopped time? The smile was only a facade then..."I have to admit, I'm interested in that detail."  
  
Forcing myself to compose, I folded the paper quietly, the pages not so much as rustling. It was useless now, drenched in tea. Why had I felt compelled to egg him into asking, did I want to speak? It was something new then. "Firstly it's not my style to shoot a man in full view of the public, no matter how big a criminal I may believe him to be...It's not something they need to see." He was watching, eyes stoney now as I spoke. Disapproving...? "Also, I'm in no hurry to fight with you. You seem to be able to take away my only fighting advantage over other targets...I don't like that. Thirdly," I took a sip of what tea remained in my cup. "I do not believe you are Vash the Stampede."  
  
He was silent, as was I. This felt like a parting moment. I stood, took my paper, and walked off the patio into the street. The blonde man did not follow.  
  
***  
  
"GOD DAMNIT!"   
  
I shook the little tin in my hands like a five year old, rattling the contents around, peering into the little black hole opening. Sitting on a stone bench outside the general store, I was quickly gathering stares from passerbys. I didn't care and kept cursing. At the current rate this tin was aggrivating me, I expected to be freezing time in about four minutes or so...  
  
"Don't ya hate it when ya buy a whole tin, and they don't have da flavour you want?" The strangely accented voice beside me made me snap up my head, hair flying back. The tin clenched to tightly in my hands that my fingers made indentations in the metal, my teeth were clenched.   
  
I gazed upon the stranger leaning against the building besides me. I couldn't tell if it was male or female, the black coat's collar went up well to their cheek and the weatherbeaten black hat was tucked down over the front of their face. I snorted and let the hand clutching the tin of fruit drops drop between my knees, dangling there. "Yes," I snapped, doing my best to excersize some control on my tone. "Personally I find the only thing more objectionable is getting a scorpion dropped down your ass in the middle of sex, hmm?"  
  
The stranger didn't respond or move for a moment. With deft and curious movements of their hands, they pulled another tin of candy from a pocket somewhere on the black jacket. They must have gotten them from the same store, perhaps moments ago. I snorted and rattled my own tin in my hand. Pulling out the metal plug with their thumb and index, the stranger tipped the tin into their hand and moved the drops around in their palm. Sugar powder dusted off on the black jacket, bright and streaking dusty white trails. "Ya strike me as a grape person, nyu."   
  
"You strike me as one who wants something."   
  
"Nope, don't want nothin at da moment." Selecting a drop from the multitude in their hand, the black clothed stranger dumped the remainder back into the tin and plugged it up again, returning it to its unseen home in the jacket. Holding out the selected drop to me, they did not look in my direction. Good preception, this one had. It was grape I was looking for in the first place. I took the drop and nodded thanks, popping it into my mouth. The stranger continued to talk. "I just thought I'd come by ta warn ya," Tipping the rim of the hat upwards with their thumb, I could see a pair of glasses nearly obscuring dark brown eyes. An eyebrow quirked upwards at me. I took in the shape of the face quickly. Female. My apparent guardian was a female. "I been watchin ya a while now, Dimma, and I admire yer work. Da thing is, ya seem ta have picked up a tail or two."  
  
Mentally, I reviewed, rolling the fruit drop across my tongue quietly. That was deffinitly true, although I hadn't seen much of this tail. Damn, I must have been blind lately. If this person had been following me for however long she had, and I hadn't even seen her, something was up. But which trail was closest? May D, Hoyes? Or was it someone new, someone I wasn't sure of yet? The blonde man or the red haired girl?   
  
"All of da above, actually," The stranger lowered the hat rim and I raised my eyebrows to her, disbelieving. A mind reader? Cliche...and odd. She seemed to have understood again. "Nah, I'm not a mind reader. I can, however, think da same way ya can. And hence, predict yer thoughts, Dimma."  
  
"How very convinient for you."  
  
"Ya'd be surprised. In any case, I just figured I should bring it ta yer attention. By da way, I'm gonna be travellin with ya from now on."  
  
"Pleasent. One should know the names of one's companions." I snapped the drop in half on my teeth. "You would be?"  
  
"Call me Foxtail. Ashido Foxtail." Ashido moved back the sleeve of the black jacket so slightly, but I caught sight of something. Scars, burn scars across her arms. I said nothing and continued to crunch what remained of the drop. "Well," Foxtail tapped the face of the watch upon her wrist a few times and glanced up at the sun. "That bein said, I'd say it's time ta get outta here."  
  
I gathered my feet beneith me and stood, sealing and pocketing my own candy. So many people seemed to be eager to meet with me lately. It was growing peculiar...and bothersome. Glancing slowly towards Foxtail, I wondered aloud. "What do you think of time stopping for me, then."  
  
It was impossiable to miss the smirk that showed under the rim of the hat. "How very convinient for ya."  
  



End file.
